Machine for processing lightsensitive sheets



p 1943- I H. H. SULLIVAN 2,330,396

MACHINE FOR PROCESSING LIGHT SENSITIVE SHEETS Original Filed Oct. 10, 1938 14,001,, 'Illllllllllll u 0.

INVENTOR. 1715. 6mm

BY A9.

ATTORNEY.

va tank 4| containing water.

Patented Sept; 28, 1943 I i SENSITIVE SHEETS 7 Harry B. Sullivan, Roehester,.N. Y., assigncr to Paragon Revolute Corporation,

Rochester,

N. Y., a corporation of New York Original application October 10, 1938, Serial No. 234,203. Divided and this application October 22, 1942, Serial No. 463,014

2 Claims.

This invention relates to a machine for processing light sensitized sheets.

In former machines of this type when it was desired to finish sensitized papers or the like requiring diiierent types of fixing or toning solutions, it was necessary to empty the treating tank and substitute a treating solution appropriate for the paper to be used. Such a procedure was inconvenient to the user and delayed the production of prints in the machine. In accordance with one feature of the invention, the machine is provided with two treating tanks containing solutions for fixing or toning the two types of paper currently in use and means are provided for selectively guiding strips of photographic paper through the proper solution to the exclusion of the other.

In the drawing, the numeral 5 generally designatesa machine comprising a printer unit 6, a developing or finishing unit 'I and a drier unit 8.

The printer unit 6 in the apparatus shown includes a rotatable glass cylinder 9 in which one or more lamps ID are provided for the purpose of exposing light sensitized paper, cloth or the like designated 1 I through a transparent or translucent drawing or tracing in the manner now wellknown.

As the exposed sensitized material I I leaves the printer 6 it is guided by rolls 38, 39 and 40 through strip is guided by a roll 42 through a tank 43 also containing water to insure that the paper is thoroughly saturated before it engages the roll 42 which otherwise might introduce wrinkles in the strip. Thereafter the web or strip of paper passes over the guide roll 44 to a fixing solution.

In former machines of this character, a single tray for a treating solution was provided so that when it was desired to change to a sensitized paper requiring a diiierent treating solution it became necessary to drain the tray and refill it with the appropriate solution. However, the present machine is provided with two tanks 45 and 46, in side by side relation, one of which such as 45 may contain hypo and the other tank 45, may contain potash, so that two types of paper, one requiring hypo and the other requiring potash in its fixing or toning, may be treated in the machine without the annoyance and delay of draining and substituting the required solution. It will, of course, be understood that when the hypo solution is used, the paper should not pass through the potash solution and vice versa. A pipe P for overflow has branches con- Th'ence the paper nected to the tanks 43, 45, and 54. The paper is advanced through the developing unit I in the well-known manner but in order to provide for selectively guiding the paper into the desired one of the tanks 45 or 45, a pair of rollers 41 and 48 substantially co-extensive with the width of the paper to be fed through the machine, are mounted at the respective ends of a pair of arms 49. One of these arms is pivotally mounted at an intermediate point thereon at one side of the machine and the other is similarly mounted at the other side of the machine. Suitabie detents of any well-known construction may be used for holding the arms 49 and the rolls 4! and 48 supported thereon, in one of two selected positions, for example, each detent 50 may be in the form of a spring-actuated pin projecting in such a direction that it can engage respectively the openings 5| in one of the arms. As illustrated, the arms 49 are in such position that their roll 41 mounted thereon, directs the paper into the hypo solution wh le the dotted line position shows the arms 49 in their alternate position in which the roll 48 carried thereon guides the paper into the potash solution.

Let it be assumed that the arms 49 are in the selected position illustrated herein in which case the strip of paper is guided by the roll 41 into the hypo solution in the tank 45 from which the paper emerges and passes over the guide rolls 52 and 53 into the washing water in the tank 54. Let it now be assumed that the arms 49 are in the selected position shown by the dotted lines, in which case the paper after leaving the tank of water 43 passes over the guide rolls 44 and 52 and thence about the guide roll 48 into the potash solution in the tank 45. On emerging from this tank the strip of paper passes over the guide roll 53 and around the roll which is immersed in the washing solution contained in the tank 54.

The strip of paper having been thus fixed or toned and having been washed in the tank 54 passes to the drier unit 8 which may be of any well-known construction.

This application is a division of application, Serial No. 234,203, filed October 10, 1938.

The present invention provides an arrangement whereby two different types of sensitized sheets may be selectively processed without undue delay and without dumping any of the processing solution.

What I claim is:

1. In a machine of the class described a frame having supporting means mounted therein, a plurality of liquid-containing troughs supported by said means, rollers mounted in said frame above said troughs, one of said rollers being in fixed position at one side of said troughs and above the same, a second roller being mounted in said frame to dip in the middle trough, a third roller being mounted to dip in an end trough and a fourth roller being pivotally mounted to dip into 7 V kind in the hypo solution but not in said potash and out of the remaining trough, said last men- I ti'oned roller having a handle and a locking de- Vice to hold it in difierent positions of? adjustment.

2. In a developing machine, a watenwash, a'

hypo tank with a roller adjustably mounted to move into and out of the solution therein, a potash tank with a roller dipping in the solution therein, an additional water wash, and means for passing a sheet of paper continuously through said machine past said rollers and said water wash, and means for moving said adjustable roller to immerse a span of paper of one solution and to elevate a span of paper of another 1 kind above said hypo solution but in contact with roller. 

